Then, fearing lest Milo, or some other of the men she knew, might come in search of her and wonder at her desire to mope alone under the stars, she had turned back to the hotel.
As she mounted the last stair to the veranda, a man in dinner clothes stepped forward from one of the porch's great white pillars, and advanced to meet her.
"There's a corner table at the Cafe de la Paix, in Paris," he greeted her, striving to control his voice and to speak lightly, "that every one on earth must pass by, sooner or later.

The front veranda of the Royal Palm is like that.
Soon or late, everybody crosses it.

When I got back this afternoon, I heard you had left home and that you were somewhere in Miami.

I couldn't find you.

So I came here--and waited." Claire had halted, at first sound of Gavin Brice's pleasantly slow voice, and she stood facing him, wide-eyed and pale, her breath failing.
"I had to go to Washington to make my report," said he, speaking low and fast.